Chapter 25: Chapter 24 "Duelist" Consecution
Many people in the woods kept moving forward, and some of them finally emerged from the ashen white ground and arrived at the true part of the Spirit Realm.
They came to distinctly different islands, where everything before their eyes gradually transformed.
The islands of the Spirit Realm were formed by the subconscious of numerous intelligent beings throughout history. Due to their strong aggregate nature, the islands would undergo mysterious reactions and gradually evolve into historical gaps made up of those intelligent beings' subconsciousness when encountering conscious entities from reality.
An old man walked through the island, witnessing the illusions around him gradually materializing into reality.
His pale hair meticulously groomed, the eyes behind his glasses revealed the accumulation of years and the depth of experience, his wisdom as if a moving repository of knowledge.
The old man was the headmaster of one of the six ancient libraries, the Sapphire Library.
The so-called "ancient libraries" referred to the mysterious organizations primarily dedicated to collecting "Extraordinary materials", "Mysterious rare artifacts", "Extraordinary Bequest", "mysterious creatures", and even the "Extraordinary Exponents" themselves, among almost all other superhuman elements.
The Sapphire Library was the foremost of the six ancient libraries on the Ouden Continent, with its primary collection focus on "Extraordinary Bequests".
The headmaster calmly recorded everything he perceived, and as he muttered to himself, a feather quill floated by his side, automatically transcribing everything on paper:
"After entering this mysterious world, the consciousness of Extraordinary Exponents becomes much weaker than in the real world, and they can basically only perform at a lower major level."
"It seems that the root cause depends on the level of Spirituality. If mysterious beings or gods were to come to this world, their strength in theory would not weaken."
"Hmm, something interesting is happening around me. Those mysterious powers are forming shadows of history, resembling architectural styles from around three hundred years ago. It's as if I have returned to a bygone era."
"In theory, the subconscious left by intelligent life should be the side with the most intense emotions they had during life."
"Then, the historical gaps projected on the 'island' I am on should theoretically also be the points in time where those intelligent beings had their most intense emotions."
The next moment, the headmaster raised his head to see a meteor shower raining down from the sky, and suddenly, many panicked and fearfully fleeing people refreshed around him.
Everyone projected in the scene seemed vividly alive, with genuine emotions in their eyes, making everything appear incredibly real!
He quickly recalled something from the history books about an event three hundred years ago, when the famous city of Leone in the Lorne Empire was destroyed by a massive volcanic eruption.
Excitement involuntarily surfaced in the headmaster's eyes.
"So it is, what a magical Spirit Realm, it will probably be a brand-new world that we will be utterly fascinated with in the future!"
Afterwards, he sensed some extremely terrifying presence, emanating an aura of annihilation and distortion – the black cross shining high in the sky, as if signifying an end to all things, its power to destroy incomparably more formidable than the numerous meteors soon to fall!
For the first time in over a hundred years, the headmaster showed a look of fear; he stood among roaring flames, explosive blasts, and screams of agony, muttering to himself while submerged in the fire.
"What exactly is that great existence?"
——
Karl acquired a new Spiritual Radiance from the "Duelist" Spiritual Laws.
The advancing member of the Fischer family was, without a doubt, Lucius Fischer.
He was a seasoned warrior who had been through numerous battles, and also a temporary commander on the battlefield, able to play a role that was marginally greater than the sum of the other two.
Apart from Extraordinary Exponents of the "Path of Contract", other rank Extraordinary Exponents could not switch to another God Pantheon stairway.
The golden-red Spiritual Radiance, brought out from the Spirit Realm to the real world by Karl, still saw all members of the Fischer family kneeling on the ground.
The Spiritual Radiance emitted an intense heat that made everyone's spirit surge with a strange sensation.
"My Lord, you truly are a generous and merciful deity!"
Irene couldn't help but praise from the depth of her heart.
How magnificent!
They suddenly saw a golden-red orb of light fly onto Lucius's body.
"Great Lord of the Lost, thank you for your gift and trust. I, Lucius Fischer, as your most faithful warrior, will fight for your will until the very end of fate."
Unfortunately, Karl could feel the emotions of those he was connected with.
The most sincere devotional emotions had only ever appeared in Irene over the years, and even Byrne only had them during the very few times he was lost.
As for Lucius, that man had never been truly devout in the real sense of the word.
It's just that Karl didn't really care.
"Huh!"
Lucius narrowed his eyes, excitedly clenched his fists tightly, and took a deep breath.
He had a premonition that he would be the one chosen to ascend to the next rank, but when the power truly arrived, he still couldn't contain his excitement in the depths of his heart.
Lucius felt he was getting closer and closer to that goal that had once seemed like an unattainable nightmare.
For that once distant goal, he kept using the power of the Lord of the Lost, feigning so-called loyalty, and perhaps all this clumsy acting had been seen through by It, no, by Him.
Someday, someone as cruel and selfish as himself would surely fall into hell under the curse of the Lord of the Lost, and tumble down into the deepest and darkest abyss.
He felt his physical fitness improve further, about twice as much as his original level, which was just slightly beyond that of an ordinary person.
The increase in spirituality was still not very significant. The spirituality of the 2nd Rank Duelist on the Path of Conquest was actually about the same as the 1st Rank "Squire" and "Chronicler" of the other two paths.
There was no helping it, that's just how the melee Consecution was.
Afterward, Lucius gained two new Extraordinary traits, namely "Quickdraw" and "Sword Brandishing."
"Quickdraw" is an extremely interesting and practical Extraordinary trait.
When enemies around you harbor hostility and want to attack you, your reaction speed would increase by dozens of times in the brief span of one second.
This is a very useful ability, especially for preventing surprise attacks. Even in situations beyond your line of sight, if you suddenly find everything around you slowing down, you'll instantly realize that you're being ambushed.
After a relatively safe trial, Lucius, in such a state, could even dodge the shots of a flintlock at close to medium range.
Lucius didn't need to be faster than the bullets, he just had to dodge the trajectory of the bullets before they were fired while everything around him slowed down.
The second Extraordinary trait is "Sword Brandishing," which briefly consumes some of his own spirituality, and suddenly increases his attack speed by several times.
Although the trait is named "Sword Brandishing," the actual weapon could be anything: a sword, a spear, or a flintlock.
Since the acceleration effect only applies to the upper half of the body, it could entirely be considered as enhancing only "attack speed."
However, "Sword Brandishing" lasts for only a very short duration, mere seconds.
Lucius's increase in strength further emboldened the Fischer family.
The average power of the 1st Rank Consecution was roughly equivalent to that of a low-level Beginning knight, whereas stepping onto the 2nd Rank of Consecution was nearing a high-level Beginning knight.
However, this time the purchase of Extraordinary materials consumed too much money, leaving the Fischer family with only about seventeen Gold Coins, far from enough to buy other Class 2 Extraordinary Materials.
As everyone was bent on making money, one of Grandma Narda's sons brought news that their band of thieves had stumbled upon information that a rare mysterious creature had been spotted in the jungle.
The good news invigorated the Fischer family; if they could not afford the Extraordinary materials, perhaps they could skip the middleman and start with raw materials.